This invention relates to foods; and more particularly to flavored foods, and specifically pet foods, having added thereto .alpha.-Mercaptoacetophenone or derivatives thereof for the purpose of providing a meat flavor to a meatless food, or augmenting the meat flavor of a meat-containing food.
The consumption of food involves many complex factors. Consumption is always affected by supply. Further complicating the food supply is that food must not only be edible, it must also be acceptable to the consumer. This acceptability to the consumer involves many complex factors. Added to these factors are the complications of custom and national tradition that distinguish and interfere with the consumption of otherwise edible material. In other words, not only is the food supply short, some of the food which is available, nutritional and edible is still unacceptable. This unacceptability is due in part, to the organoleptic property of the food known as flavor. Flavor is basically associated with the taste, aroma, appearance, and texture of foodstuffs. The taste and aroma aspect of a flavorant are major variables in determining the acceptability of a foodstuff.
Much research time, skill, and money are devoted to the development of suitable flavors which can then be used to render acceptable those edible materials or foods which are otherwise unacceptable. Flavorants can render foods more acceptable from both a taste and aroma standpoint. Additionally, flavorants can help a particular food maintain its natural aroma and avoid flavor deterioration. These advantages for flavorants justify the time spent in determining suitable flavorants.
Flavorants have contrasting requirements of thermal stability and volatility. Aroma stability is required so that both the aroma and desired taste will remain with the food for a sufficient time to achieve the desired effect of making the food more acceptable. Volatility is required so that the aroma of the flavorant will in some way indicate its presence in the food and perform the desired function of making it more acceptable to the consumer. However, the more volatile a flavorant is, the shorter period of time it will provide the pleasing aroma. On the other hand, the more thermally stable a flavorant is, the less volatile it becomes and more is required to give a pleasing aroma. These contrasting desirable features must be balanced in order to achieve an effective flavorant.
In addition to having the desired volatility and long term thermal stability, the flavorant must also be capable of surviving hydrolytic conditions and strenuous food processing conditions. These conditions can be extremely strenuous and have an adverse affect on a compound which must be volatile. Thus, the incorporation of this desired flavorant into a food may cause problems in the formulation of a food containing the flavorant.
Food as used herein is well defined in the prior art. U.S. Pat. No. 3,876,809 to Mussinan et al. (incorporated herein by reference) clearly defines food and the purposes thereof. Flavorants provide organoleptic acceptability for foods. Since meat is a most acceptable form of protein food, it is extremely desirable to provide both the taste and aroma of meat to be added to protein containing foods. In this fashion, protein containing foods not having a meat flavor may be made more acceptable to the consumer.
These flavorant compounds provide meat-like flavor for meatless edible compositions and also augment the existing meat flavor in meat containing foods. In this fashion, these compounds are suitable as flavorants. Foods containing no meat, but which are nutritionally equivalent to meat, can be made more acceptable by including such flavorants therein to provide the aroma and taste flavor of meat in addition to the appearance and nutrition desired. Where meats are used, the flavorant can maintain or augment the meat aroma and taste to thereby provide wider use of otherwise unusable meat portions. In this fashion, the flavorants can render more acceptable otherwise unacceptable or acceptable -- but not preferred products.
A major problen with the use of aliphatic .alpha.-mercaptoketones as flavorants is that they are usually volatile due to relatively low molecular weight. This volatility means that the compounds are not stable to the amount of heat used in food processing to a sufficient extent to survive the heat processing conditions. However, the desirable flavor makes it useful to have such compounds in the product. If it were possible to stabilize the mercaptoketone compound while maintaining the desired flavoring characteristics, a highly suitable result can be obtained. By replacing an alkyl group with an aromatic phenyl group, improved stability may be achieved, because the larger aromatic molecules are less volatile than the alkyl group.